Posts

Showing posts with the label pointless revolve

Featured Post

Take me to the world: Hide and Seek @parktheatre

Image
In a small town where everyone knows everyone, if you don't like it, you might feel that the only logical thing to do is to disappear. Especially if you think it will help your social media rankings. The loneliness and isolation of youth meet influencers in the wild in Tobia Rossi's Hide and Seek. And while events take a darker turn, the humour and the intimacy make this piece about youth on the edge (of trending) fascinating and enjoyable. It's currently playing at Park Theatre .  Mirko (Nico Cetrulo) is exploring a cave with his camera when he stumbles on Gio (Louis Scarpa). Gio has been missing for a while, and the town has been looking for him. But Gio is more interested in how much he is trending on TikTok. He also had a crush on Mirko. Soon, they establish a friendship and a bond. In the cave, they explore feelings they would not dare share outside. However, things turn darker when Gio is confident enough to leave the cave, while Mirko doesn't want his double life

Theatre: Love Never Dies

Image
I had the opportunity to catch a preview of Love Never Dies , the sequel to  Phantom of the Opera , Friday  night at the Adelphi Theatre in the West End. It is the show with the really creepy artwork that is starting to appear around town, and which has its opening night this week... I have yet to get around to seeing Phantom on stage, but I would like to think that I know enough about the story and the music to make sense of any follow up. I also recall many years ago playing the Michael Crawford and Sarah Brightman cast recording on a family road trip which caused my grandmother to throw up. The free association of the show with grandma's sick probably hasn't incentivised me to rush out and grab a ticket. Anyway arriving tonight at the theatre with Johnnyfox there was a buzz of activity. It was either excitement, or the sounds of people scrambling to pick up tickets from the shambolic box office. Normally at one minute to the curtain up you don't see a line of people

Theatre: Nation

Image
About half an hour into Nation , the new "exhilarating" production at the National Theatre at the Olivier Theatre, I hear whispered in my ear the words that you always wish you didn't hear on a night out: "This is a bit boring..." Alas it was the truth. The acting seemed one note, the direction flat, the music painful and there was also the return of the pointless revolve . As for the plot, it kept getting thicker every two minutes. It was as if the creative team decided to shove as much as possible of Terry Pratchett's book on stage and to hell with the consequences. Well the consequences were an awful lot of fidgeting in the audience as if they had fleas, a lot of watch staring and some fairly muted applause at intermission. Bearing all this in mind, I would have suffered the second half, but I took the advice of some wise theatre peeps who suggested that life is too short to sit through bad plays when you could be enjoying your life at the pub. I did sub

Theatre Wake: Too Close to the Sun

Image
Listen! It didn't feel like closing night of Too Close To the Sun . It felt more like a wake. Too Close To the Sun opened two weeks ago and immediately posted closing notices. We arrived almost too late for curtain up as John , Feigned Mischief and I were still having dinner across the road from the Comedy Theatre. I was keeping an eye on the theatre to watch when people went in, only to realise (almost too late), that with so few people attending the show, it was hard to tell. As we entered there was a deathly silence, and while I don't recall if there even was an overture, it felt like there should have been an organ playing funereal music. The musical is a four-hander about the last few days of the life of Ernest Hemingway. The synopsis goes something like this: Ernest plods about and tries to molest his secretary. His wife, played by Helen Dallimore , walks around the set in some rather fascinating stirrup pants and heels. Meanwhile some other guy tries to woo Helen Dalli

Theatre: They're Playing Our Song

Image
It was one of those theatrical experiences that I love. Before the second act started of They're Playing Our Song , a revival now in preview at the Menier Chocolate Factory , the man next to me apologised for blocking my view in the first act. "It's just that I am having trouble staying awake watching this truly awful show...". He did add that he loved Connie Fisher . Well... What is there not to like about Connie Fisher? She does have a star quality about her and that cruel audition on TV to win the role of Maria in The Sound of Music (which I missed) and losing all that weight during the run shows what doesn't kill you can only make you stronger. In this show she was just great as Sonia... The nice Jewish girl with the Farrah Fawcett ginger wig... Still, I was surrounded by people who just hated this preview. The West End Whingers at intermission were ready to walk out, and I would like to take some credit for keeping everyone returning to the theatre for the

Theatre: Gone With the Wind

One of the fun things about going to the theatre and blogging about it is that you can pick up the buzz and excitement about new productions as they hit town. Sadly this was not the case with Gone With the Wind . When asking around about it over the last month, the only responses I got back about it were forced smiles and phrases like... "Well... It's innnnteresting". Well now after seeing a preview of it on Tuesday night I can confirm what they are saying. It is innnteresting... And for those that don't know theatre-speak... That means it is rubbish. First of all starting with the leads. It was a curious choice to put Darius Danesh and Jill Paice in the lead roles of Rhett and Scarlett. Despite the efforts of Darius to make his voice boom and disguise with sideburns the fact he is in his twenties, he still looks like he is playing dress-up and wearing his dad's clothes. Paice doesn't fare much better either and together to pair give the show the kind of ear